Remember those classes with a drab, monotone teacher pontificating endlessly about a subject we were only marginally interested in and didn’t fully comprehend? While this might be familiar, we must ask ourselves: Am I the drab, monotone teacher?
Developing reading fluency with middle schoolers requires a mix of repeated and wide readings, with an emphasis on the latter to supplement structured practice. But it doesn’t mean working on fluency must be boring. Finding the fun in fluency isn’t just about livening up the classroom—it’s a necessity when our work as educators has become increasingly harder because of technology. I mean . . . teaching is more art than science, right? If I can get a 12-year-old invested in literacy more than an online trend, let’s be honest: I’m winning!
Making Supplementing Structured Fluency Practice Fun
Every day in my Grade 7 English language arts (ELA) classroom, my students practice echo reading. We do this while reading our learning goals, objectives, etc. I love having fun with echo reading, especially focusing on prosody, which refers to emotion and expression while reading. I’ll have a student read the learning goal first. Then I’ll read that same goal in a shrill voice, drop to a low voice, speed read, and finally elongate a monosyllabic word into a multisyllabic word (think Dr. Cox and his rants aimed at JD on the television show Scrubs). The takeaway is that, while developing reading fluency, you can have fun with your students in ways that engage their sense of humor—and yours. This daily routine promotes accuracy, automaticity, and prosody. There are also great resources for teachers out there, including Student Achievement Partners, a free tool that helps students develop reading fluency.
I once had a conversation with David Liben, in which he spoke about the continuum of fluency supports. He told me that most students can grow their reading proficiency by a grade level with highly effective teaching, even if they follow along! When David reiterated this in my professional learning training, I thought, It’s imperative to tell students to follow along AND explain the “why” behind the “what.” In full transparency, when I told my students the “why” (i.e., rationale/logic/research) behind the “what” (i.e., following along and why fluency matters), getting them to follow along (i.e., the “how”) was so much easier.
Additionally, fluency is a critical skill in middle school, serving as a bridge between decoding words and comprehending complex texts. In recent years, the Science of Reading—a body of research focusing on how reading skills develop—has illuminated effective strategies for enhancing fluency. Middle school teachers can leverage these insights to boost your students' reading abilities.
How to Improve Reading Fluency
At a recent virtual professional learning session by The Reading League, I learned a great deal about how to develop reading fluency. Case in point: How do you view fluency? As an input—a frontloaded skill—or as an output, where other literacy skills contribute to fluency? I was struck by the idea that fluency should be viewed as the output when we apply the various nuances of Scarborough’s Reading Rope. Although I teach students in Grade 7, some are reading well below grade level, so I teach foundational reading skills to give them access to broader comprehension skills. Students above grade level do not need fluency practice with accuracy and automaticity because at this stage, a grade-level reading rate is almost equivalent to adult proficiency.
Let’s think about this practically. Here are some solutions you can use to improve reading fluency with your students:
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Read learning goals or objectives in different voices.
Have students echo your pacing, prosody, and energy after stating which type of voice you’re reading in so students know what type of prosodic reading they’re hearing or executing. Ensure you frontload with stating your voice type: Is it enthusiastic, trepidatious, questioning, angry? Are you modeling or practicing a louder or softer pitch? This low-lift engagement strategy can quickly boost fluency data in your classroom, and it’s a great way to discuss and practice the learning goal. -
Differentiate between instruction and independent levels.
Appreciate the nuances between a student’s instructional level (i.e., what your students can do with your support with grade-level material) and their independent level (i.e., what your students can do without your support). Students make fluency gains and overall reading gains with instructional-level text, so it’s crucial that all students are exposed to grade-level content with appropriate scaffolds. Research shows that students make fluency gains with “stretch text,” but it’s important to ensure that your students can actually read it. Having success with independent reading is important, as is variety, but if they’re not challenged, they won’t grow. -
Embed fluency in everything you do.
Give specific praise and feedback to students when they’re reading to allow them to aim and train their focus when practicing fluency. “Great effort pushing through that dialogue!” “I appreciate that you noticed those commas and took shorter pauses and longer pauses at those periods!” Being specific is critical to progress. -
Provide explicit instruction in phonics and word recognition.
If you have older students reading below grade level like I do, they may need support with foundational reading skills. Explicit phonics instruction, a core component of the Science of Reading, is crucial even at this stage. You can integrate phonics lessons into your ELA curriculum to reinforce word-recognition skills, use data from assessments to identify specific phonics skills that need reinforcement, and tailor your instruction to meet the diverse needs of your students.
Finding the Fun in Fluency
In the end, fluency is a mindset that should permeate throughout your classroom, even if you aren’t a literacy teacher by training. If you’re thoughtful about fluency, you can be masterful at weaving it into everything you do. Once you find the fun in fluency, you and your students (even middle schoolers) will relish any opportunity to demonstrate how far they’ve come.
Want more ideas for developing fluency? Check out Kyair’s social commentary on X @kyairb and his video that shows intentional fluency practice between a teacher and student focused on prosody.
